SQL Server 2005 came out long before Windows 7 and (largely due to UAC) they don’t actually get on out of the box. Symptoms include prerequisite warnings about IIS7, getting an abrupt error when you finish the installation and although the SQL server service may start SQL Management Studio will not. This is simply what you need to do to get a working SQL Server 2005 including SQL Management Studio on Windows 7.
Download and install the latest x32/x64 SQL native client.
Install SQL Server 2005 from your installation media and ensure that towards the end you select to NOT start the SQL service. Personally since I use SQL Server 2005 on my workstation as a test environment I’m happy assign it the Local System account.
Download and install SQL Server 2005 SP3…and just before it finishes installing you’ll see something like this…
SQL Server 2005 User Provisioning Tool for Vista
This is the SQL Server 2005 User Provisioning Tool for Vista and it lets you know that admin users on the Vista workstation (Windows 7 in our case) will not have admin rights in SQL Server unless explicitly stated. Close it for now since because the SQL service is not running, any new users will not be saved. The SP3 installation will now finish, abruptly.
Reboot your workstation to allow the SQL services to start.
From the start menu run the ‘SQL Server 2005 Surface Area Configuration’ tool. Select the “Add New Administrator” link and select which users you wish to assign access to. There is no confirmation, the dialog just goes away without any error messages.
Start SQL Management Studio and you’ll now be able to login. No errors, just a fully working SQL Server on Windows 7 
Hi,
I followed the same steps you mentioned. I installed Sql Server SP3 & rebooted. After that i opened Sql Server 2005 Surface Area Configuration &clicked on Add New Administrator. New Window pops-up, but both privilege boxes are empty & Ok button is disabled.
There is one textbox in the upper left corner which has value com32\Admin for label User to Provision. I logged in as administrator. I am installing SQL Server 2005 standard Edition.
Am I missing something? Any help will be appreciated.
Hi Manjunath,
The text box is filled in with your username\ so com32\Admin sounds good.
If there’s nothing in either of the boxes below it sounds like the MSSQLSERVER service isn’t started…can you confirm?
Thanks for posting this. Installing the latest version of SQL Native Client made all the difference. I did however have to turn on the SQL server service before I could get the SP3 update to work. This was on W7 x64.
Oh right, thanks! I’ve installed it on about 3 W7 servers, 2×64 and 1×86. All three installed slightly differently with services needing to be restarted several times.
Tnx mate !
Looks to me like you’re installing SQL 2005 from Disk 2 rather than Disk 1!
I did all the steps ,but doesn’t work.When i run SQL server Management studio there’s no server connection. If I try to register a new server on the database engine, there is not a server name to choose. Could you help me?? thanks
Hi can you help me with my problem running the installation of SQL server 2005 Developer edition on my windows 7 desktop machine. Everything is installed except for the MSSQLSERVER service. It always give me a message The SQL Server service failed to start during installation. Thanks hope you can help me.
Double check you have installed the latest SQL Client but most importantly check you’ve run ‘SQL Server 2005 Surface Area Configuration’ (from the start menu) and select the user you wish to add.
Make sure the SQL Server service is started and then try connecting to or alternatively 127.0.0.1 with windows authentication.